Culture Shock
by Princess Pinky
Summary: Liam shows up at Daphne's school to try and speak with her, but it goes anything but fine.


**A/N:** Spoilers for 1x02 and 1x03. This takes place before the end of 1x03, when Daphne is still mad at Liam for not defending her against his rude friends.

_**Culture Shock**_

Vibrations curled through the black lacquered lunch table and Daphne Vasquez felt them against her bare arms. She was watching a couple of fellow Carlton students play a one-on-one game as she waited for Emmett to get back from the restroom and expected to see his face when she rotated her gaze back across the table. Instead, she found the long, chocolate skinned face of Liam Lupo smiling back at her. Her smile melted like a popsicle on a summer afternoon.

Liam cupped his hands as if he was waiting for someone to pour wine into them and then dropped one hand into a point as he asked, "How are you?"

Daphne considered correcting the fact that he should have curled his hands in before the point, but decided against it. Instead, she splayed her right hand and jabbed her thumb against the center of her chest twice. _"Fine,"_ she replied pointedly.

A little smirk curled at the right corner of Liam's lip and caved into a dimple as he gave her a smug half-smile. The eye above the dimple squinted a bit as his cheek pushed out beneath it. "Well that's rude."

Daphne's eyebrow shot up in surprise. "Excuse me?"

Liam slid his arm out of his backpack strap and let it drop to the bench beside him, then he unzipped it quickly and retrieved a stack of books with local library barcodes with titles pertaining to American Sign Language and Deaf Culture. He pulled one out from the middle of the pile and opened it to a page he'd folded down. "When someone asks you how you are, it's rude to say 'fine' unless you're actually fine. And even then, this says you're supposed to elaborate. Lying," he said, emphasizing the word by sliding the back of his fingers and hand in single smooth motion under his chin, "isn't kosher in Deaf Culture."

Daphne touched the tip of her tongue to the edge of her teeth, contemplating whether to be touched at the idea that Liam had gone out and researched deaf culture after their confrontation over the fried zucchini the day before or be angry that he wouldn't leave her alone even after she thought she had made herself perfectly clear about not wanting anymore to do with him. "And how do you know what I want and what I don't?" she retorted. "You didn't the other night!"

Liam waved his hand up and down. "Non-manual markers," he replied. He fingerspelt the letters _A-K-A_ and spoke, "Body language."

Daphne pursed her lips. He was learning, which she gave him silent credit for, but that didn't negate what he'd done. _Fine,_ she repeated, but did not accompany the sign with a voiceover, but instead, a glare. _You want to know how I really feel?_

Liam watched Daphne draw her middle finger in a line up the center of her chest and swift motion that caused a strand of her light orange hair to flip into the air. He hadn't expected her to go into straight sign and had no idea what she was telling him, but going by the look on her face, it wasn't pretty.

Daphne pointed at herself and held the motion for a moment, barely allowing Liam to realize what she was doing before she formed her hand into the sign for the letter _P_ and touched it, specifically her middle finger, to the tip of her nose. In a flash, she drew her hand back from her face towards Liam's, quickly moving her hand from the letter _P_ to an_ O _and then an _F_ before halting it right in front of his face.

If he hadn't already been familiar with the fact that the sign for _F_ was the same as the universal sign for 'good job' or 'perfect,' he would have thought Daphne was complimenting him. As he recalled back to his childhood fingerspelling lessons, he remembered a double letter could be represented with a slide of the hand. Liam stared at the _F_ in front of his face, then slowly repeated the letters he'd seen her sign to him just moments earlier: _P-O-F_. Or, _P-O-F-F_, if, in fact, the _F_ had been a letter slide. He shook his head as 'poff' was not a word he was familiar with and it made no sense. "Poff?" he finally asked, his eyes searching hers for an answer. "I don't know what-" Then he stopped. "P-off." Liam gnashed his palm to his forehead. "P-Oed. P-Offed. _Pissed off._"

"Ding! Ding! Ding!" Daphne snapped, miming the action of banging a bell with a drumstick.

Liam's face fell. "I'm sorry," he sighed. "I don't know what else to say." He curled his hand into a fist and rubbed it in slow, deliberate circles over his chest: _I'm really sorry!_

Daphne squinted, gauging his face against the timing of his apology. She puckered her lips, almost ready to say something, when Emmett approached the table behind Liam. His eyes were scrunched into slits, which she already knew wasn't because of the burning sunlight. Abruptly, she rose from her seat and swung her backpack over her left shoulder. As Emmett reached out to touch Liam's shoulder, Daphne waved her hand in a stopping motion. "I've got to go," she spoke as she rounded the table.

"Daphne!" Liam pleaded, calling to the redhead as she turned her back to him. He held out his hand to touch her arm and get her attention, but Emmett snatched his wrist and squeezed it, prompting Liam to lock eyes with him. Emmett didn't bother to sign anything to him, but Liam received the message loud and clear. He opened his mouth, but Emmett released his hand before he had a chance to say anything, and the latter strode off to catch up with Daphne. He watched them walk towards the front entrance of the Carlton school, as Emmett motioned his hands at a breakneck speed. "No doubt talking about me…" Liam ran his hand over his head, exasperated, then pushed his library books back into his bag.

From her peripheral vision, Daphne could make out the universal sign for_ loser_, Emmett's favorite new nickname for Liam, and the sign for _understand_. She turned her head over her shoulder as Emmett carried on his silent rant and saw Liam zipping up his backpack before taking off towards the parking lot. When she turned her attention back to Emmett, she saw him holding up his left hand with all his fingers tucked into his fist except for his index finger, which was sticking straight up as if he was counting the number one, while his right hand was formed into the shape of a C, which he curled around his pointing index finger: _culture_. She knew Emmett was right: Liam didn't understand her culture. The difference was, he was trying. And the thing that shocked her was that she didn't know what that meant yet.


End file.
